


on your last day of peace

by verboseDescription



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Cancer (implied), Hotels, POV Second Person, Pre-Canon, Stream of Consciousness, this is mainly just
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 23:08:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,967
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29848911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verboseDescription/pseuds/verboseDescription
Summary: Despite the universe's attempts to make it otherwise, Gerry Keay tries to have a good day.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 24





	on your last day of peace

Today, you wake up before Gertrude, a fact you celebrate by rubbing it in her face. She swats at your arm when you shake her, muttering something under her breath as she sits up. 

“I see you’re feeling better, then,” Gertrude says, finding her glasses on the nightstand. She squints your direction. It’s only half an accusation. You know Gertrude well enough to know the only thing she’s really mad about is how badly things went the night before. She doesn’t blame you. This isn’t how she acts when she thinks you’ve done something wrong. But doesn’t change the fact that her glare still feels like a blade of glass stuck into your side. Sometimes, you wonder if you’ve always been so sensitive or if there’s something about this year that’s softened your edges.

“Maybe I’m just excited about breakfast,” you tell her. She rolls her eyes. “It’s my favorite part of staying in hotels, honest. Have you seen those danishes? There’s nowhere else you can go to get something so completely mediocre.”

“Hmm,” Gertrude says. You hop off her bed as she gets up and moves to find her clothes. “One of the hidden costs of a free meal.”

You laugh.

“I’ve been looking through the Ellis statement,” you tell her. “I think I might know where to go next. There’s been a similar attack around here recently. Saw it in the news.”

“And here I thought it would simply go into hibernation,” Gertrude says with a sigh. She gives you a nod of approval. “It sounds like you’re having quite the productive day.”

“I do my best,” you tell her, giving a mock salute as you head out the door. “I’ll let you get dressed. I’ll be in the lobby. I want to drink some terrible coffee.”

There’s not too many other people eating when you walk down to get breakfast. Just a dad with his kid, clearly still half asleep and nodding off at their table, and a woman on her phone, barely touching her eggs. You make yourself some oatmeal and pour yourself a cup of coffee. After careful consideration, you pour some milk and grab five packets of sugar, along with a muffin. If something’s going to taste bad, you might as well make it sweet.

The father’s nudging his daughter with a fond expression on his face, but she’s too young to find any pleasure in waking up early, so she just swats his arm and groans.

“They don’t even have chocolate chip,” she whines. 

Last night, you slept in a B&B run by the Stranger. It was owned by a couple made out of porcelain with twin painted smiles. The room they gave you reminded you of every Bed and Breakfast you’ve stayed in with your mother and it looked like none of them. You think you might miss it.

A part of you wonders if this longing could have been strong enough to have saved you from danger if you hadn't entered the building with the express purpose of burning it down. After a lifetime of travel, standing in a room filled with strangers was too familiar to be a fear. There was a limit to how deep something like that could hurt.

It’s not that you think there’s something inherently comforting about hotels or anything like that. It’s just that you’ve stayed in too many of them for them not to mean anything to you. How many times have you booked a room at the first place you could find, desperate to finally rest without fear of your mother’s ghost? How many times have you watched your mother book a room and breathed a sigh of relief because it was always either that or room with one of her friends?

Hotels were never any safer than anywhere else you’ve laid down your head. And just like everything else, it came with its own danger. Pinhole Books may have been born to cage you, but its wards have always been stronger than anything you’ve sewn into the underside of your coat.

The cut on your arm stings. You don’t remember when you bandaged it. If you’ve been infected by the moving porcelain, you won’t know until it crystalizes the skin around your wound.

You wonder if Gertrude was the one to wrap it for you. You can’t imagine she’d be careless enough to leave a piece of them inside you, but then again, you can’t imagine her fixing you up, either. She’s never done it before. Not that you’ve given her that many chances to. You don’t really make a habit of getting injured in ways you can’t undo yourself.

You dump the sugar into your coffee, one packet at a time. The daughter watches you with interest and disgust. You smile and go up to retrieve another and dump that in as well.

You take a sip. The daughter gasps and wrinkles her nose. It’s an appropriate reaction. The sugar does nothing to disguise the bitter taste of a rushed pot. It’s still better than nothing, but it doesn’t wake you as much as you’d hoped it would.

Your head hurts. The coffee doesn’t help with that, either.

You know that it’s a bad idea to keep ignoring this. The nausea you keep feeling isn’t related to any of the few statements you’ve read, and your headaches have nothing to do with the knowledge that keeps finding its way into your mind. Gertrude’s been pushing you to be more active lately, but she doesn’t know you well enough to be worried about your health and you don’t know her well enough to say if she’d even let you take a break, if you asked. Archivist or not, she has no way of knowing that you’ve been up since five throwing up in the bathroom, trying to somehow puke up your entire stomach without waking her. But you’ve always known she’s had no problem leaving things behind.

There’s a quiet part of you that keeps reminding you how fragile this all is. You know this isn’t normal. And you know it can’t last forever. Curses don’t break just because they fade from view. No one gets better on hope alone. No amount of burnt coffee you drink that will save you from the way you keep looking away from yourself.

 _Just give me one day,_ you plead. _Let me pretend I’m okay just this once._

It’s been so long since you felt even this well. You’ve been talking to your eyes more lately, because your mind keeps losing the words you mean to say. The Beholding hasn’t saved you from any awkward conversations yet, but you know it will, if you give it time. Lost conversation topics aren’t the knowledge it’s used to giving you, but you’ve found that most fears can be surprisingly versatile in the face of human desperation. And that means the consequences aren’t worth the fall. If this is how you ask it to save you, your mind will be smoothed away and replaced with the sands of the Eye. It doesn’t feel like drowning, not exactly, but there’s a fear you can’t name you can feel yourself choking on.

A few more guests walk into the lobby to get breakfast. Aside from the two that are clearly mother and son, none of them look like they’ve come here together.

You’ve always found it funny how often people arrive in waves. As if all of them, in all their different rooms, all saw the clock and declared it time for a meal. When you were a kid, you used to try and predict stuff like that, but it’d always change depending on the day. Still, it wasn’t like you had much else to do. Your mum never wanted you underfoot when she prepared herself for the day ahead. So, you’d wander over to whatever dining hall the place you were staying had and wait. You’d watch the people around you and wonder what exactly led them all to exist in this space with you.

The daughter catches the eye of the son and leaps up out of her chair.

“You’re _here!”_ she cries out. “We’ve been waiting for _ages!”_

You snort. Breakfast’s only been open for half an hour. You suppose some people feel the time more severely than you do.

“Good morning, Abby,” the mother says with a smile. 

Her son runs towards the daughter and envelops her in a vibrant hug, wrapping his arms around her with such speed the daughter lets out a shriek of surprise. The mother shakes her head as the two busy themselves with conversation and goes up to the small collection of tables being passed off as a buffet line. She makes herself a plate, then picks up a muffin, which she drops into her son’s hands as she walks by.

“Remember to eat,” the mother says. “We have a big day ahead of us.”

You go back to eating your oatmeal. The few spoonfuls you’ve had already feel like too much, but you force down another all the same.

The woman and her phone are gone now. For one terrifying moment, all you can think of is the cut on your arm and the potential it brings, but then you look further, and see she’s by the front desk. She thanks the receptionist as she gives him her key card, then immediately goes back to her phone.

“Heading out now,” the woman says, not bothering to greet whoever's on the other line. “I know, I’m sorry, but I’m bringing you a muffin so you can’t get mad when I’m late. No, it doesn’t taste good, it’s free. I took it from my hotel. It’s the thought that counts.”

She’s still talking when she walks out the door.

The Stranger’s house didn’t have this. The food was about the same—not that you tried any, but there was another, stupider human guest there with you and they told you everything “tasted how you’d expect”—and the rooms were made up in the facsimile of a bedroom, just like every other place you’ve stayed, but they couldn’t get the guests right. The men and women formed from fine china were too routine to be human. When they entered the dining hall, they walked as a unified front. There was no one rubbing the sleep from their eyes. No stragglers who came through the hall a few moments later. They were a wind-up music box. Even if they didn’t all eat at the same tables, or eat the same thing, they all moved to the same beat. The rhythm of humanity involved more chaos. More loud children, interrupting the murmurs of quiet conversation. More looking through road maps and travel guides and getting distracted enough to spill their drink and shouting in surprise. The only other human guest had spent ages deciding on what to eat for no other reason then the fact they didn’t like blueberry muffins. They’d ended up eating on a scone instead, but complained that they didn’t have the right kind of tea to wash it down.

It’s fascinating, sometimes, to watch people exist without fear.

There’s someone staring at you. You stare back, face untouched by emotion.

You know your hair looks like shit. Even if the bartender hadn’t mentioned it, the length of your roots make it hard to ignore. Doesn’t mean you can do anything about it, though. You’re not a big enough asshole to redye it in the hotel sink and leave some poor staff with the mess, but the only other easy option is to go to a salon, and you’re not in the mood to have your hair touched by a stranger.

You wish you hadn’t read his statement. Your life would be a lot easier if Gertrude would stop offering new ones your way. Or if you hadn’t realized you look worse than you did when you were haunted.

The person staring adjusts their own hair, and you see their own roots. You offer up a small smile in solidarity.

“Gerard.” Gertrude’s sitting next to you now. You try not to spill your coffee in surprise. Instead, you offer her a casual smile and say, “Took you long enough.” 

Gertrude rolls her eyes and hands you a folder.

“The Ellis statement,” she prompts.

“Always straight to business with you,” you tease. The truth is, you’ve almost completely forgotten what you’d planned to say to her. Gertrude stares, unamused. “Alright, alright, give me a second.” You pull out your phone. “Look. Says they found this bloke in the river. Police are warning other residents not to stay out too late so they don’t get hit, too. Could be just an animal attack, but you… uh, the teeth. In his thigh. Glass. It, uh…”

You swallow. There’s a fog filling your mind, and the longer you struggle for words, the thicker it grows.

“Gerard?”

“I’m fine,” you insist. You don’t feel it. Nausea curls in your stomach when you stand. “Gonna go for smoke.”

Gertrude sighs, but doesn’t argue, so you walk outside and lean against the nearest wall. You take out a cigarette out of the pack in your coat pocket and light it with the novelty lighter you bought a few states back. For a moment, you just stare at it in your hand and watch the smoke curl towards the sky. Then you sigh, sit down, and take a drag.

Despite everything, this year’s been good to you. Even if you don’t trust Gertrude or what she wants from you, every day you spend with her is the longest you’ve ever been without your mother, and that’s a victory you never thought you’d have. Mary will always live within you, but at least now, it’s more of a memory than a fear, and there’s enough of a difference between the two that it still feels like freedom. 

And you like the journey you’re on now, most of the time. You’re not so selfless that you don’t feel some pride at the thought of how many people you’ve saved lately. You just wish you could stop thinking about what might’ve happened if you hadn’t been around. You don’t like the thought of missed opportunities, especially when there’s a much bigger threat looming over the two of you that you’re not sure how you’re going to solve.

It’s a bit annoying, to be honest. You never expected anyone to ask you to save the world. As nice as it would be to prove yourself worthy of the burden, there’s a larger, more practical part of you that demands to know what you’ve done to deserve being weighed down yet again by your legacy. You never meant to be yet another Von Closen in that temple of the Eye. 

You would think that’d make it easier to leave. That the threat of ancestral pride would be enough for you to ditch the Archivist and finally deal with the pounding in your skull that’s plagued you for months now. Last night, you were terrified. You lost your consciousness abruptly, with the speed of a falling dam. You had thrust your fist towards the face of a doll, only to realize there wasn’t enough of you left to change your momentum. You don’t remember how hard you hit the ground, but you remember the ache in your back, the pain of a popped wrist, and the way Gertrude scolded you for being so careless as to leave yourself vulnerable. She thought you tripped.

It hurts. Of course it does. But you can’t leave now, not when the road in front of you stretches so far. There’s still a country full of strangers in need of saving, and you can’t deny you were born to travel. 

_Tomorrow,_ you decide. _I’ll deal with this tomorrow._

You put out your cigarette and sigh. 

It's nice out today. The weather’s changing for the colder, but the sun’s still warm on your skin and the breeze provides a welcome distraction from your nausea. 

A squirrel runs through the street, a small piece of bread dangling from its mouth. The normalcy of it almost feels like a novelty. It’s not often you get to appreciate nature from the same angle as everyone else. 

You're glad you're here. You’re glad that you can listen to the way the wind rustles without flinching at the possibilities. Glad you can enjoy the newness of this location without glancing back to see if you’ve been followed by someone who claims to love you. Glad you can drink terrible coffee and watch the people around you blink the dreams from their eyes. Glad you can almost imagine yourself as one of them.

Your head hurts more than anything you’ve ever known. Your limbs are fawn-like in your fatigue. But the burnt pages of your mother are still etched into your mind and the relief that brings you is neverending. 

Today, you will have a good day. You’ll find the beast of glass you’ve been chasing and you’ll celebrate by crashing at the first restaurant you find, enjoying yet another example of America’s ridiculous portion sizes and their terrible lemonade. And maybe, after that, you’ll go back to your hotel and finally get some rest. You’ll feel better then. Of that, you’re sure.

You stand up with a groan and stretch your back. As nice as this is, you can’t stand here forever. As nice as it would be, the world won’t save itself.

As you walk back inside, you hear a bird sing. You wonder if it knows its flock has already left for winter, or if it’s still expecting an answer to its song. Maybe it just finds joy in singing alone.

**Author's Note:**

> originally, i just wanted to write Gerry hanging out at a hotel because I miss traveling. Unfortunately, sometimes pain is just part of travel.


End file.
